What I Think Conservatives Think

First, let me say that I’m not referring to the people who hang on every word of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly, and the rest of Fox’s stable. Those people aren’t conservatives; they’re morons. And I’m not referring to the “Religious Right,” who base everything they believe–or say they believe–on one evangelist or another, and who disdain such sinful concepts as reason and logic. No, I’m referring to the thoughtful people who philosophically object to federal interference in the “free market” economy, who resist every hint of “social welfare,” and who prefer the government to stay out of their lives as much as possible.

And let’s put aside the charge of hypocrisy: those who want open competition but don’t object to price supports, who don’t like welfare but are okay with corporate “stimuli,” who don’t like government programs but do visit libraries and travel on freeways, and who don’t want the feds saying what they can and can’t do except when it comes to issues like abortion and gay marriage.

The current brouhaha over a “public option” for health care has brought out all kinds of philosophies, including that of conservatives who don’t want the federal government to have anything to do with a health insurance program: The government would mess it up and cost us money, it would control our lives, it would force the private sector out of business–you know the arguments by now.

But here’s what I think is at the core of these objections–and to tell you the truth, to some extent I sympathize: Conservatives don’t like the idea of someone who’s undeserving getting their money.

It’s as simple as that. We make some decisions in our lives–to go or not to go to college, to save or not to save money, to have or not to have a family, to get or not to get a decent-paying job. We should live with the consequences of those decisions. If we work at a low-paying job, then we may not have enough money to buy a nice house. If we spend our money on a fancy boat or on drugs or on wild parties, then we may not have enough money to buy all the health insurance coverage we need. We reap what we sow.

Given that, why should people get handouts from the federal government? Why should my hard-earned taxes go to somebody who didn’t work as hard, didn’t earn as much, didn’t save as much, didn’t make as good decisions as I did? There are only so many resources, whether it’s food or transportation or education or medical care. Why should the less deserving ace out the more deserving?

When the government gives out chits for health care, somebody pays for those chits–and it’s not the person who gets them. That’s just not fair.

That, I believe, is the basic argument. And, as I say, I’m sympathetic–to a point.

There are problems with the argument. A child hasn’t had the opportunity to make those life decisions; must the child suffer the poor decisions of the parent? And sometimes people fall by the wayside because of the decisions of others: The economy enables some people to become rich, and they make decisions that adversely affect other people. So people lose their jobs or their houses or even their health through no fault of their own; must they suffer the unfeeling decisions of the corporate executive? And sometimes people have plumb bad luck–the fire that rages through their neighborhood, the cancer that rages through their stomach; must they suffer the whims of nature?

If we could guarantee that only the deserving people got government “handouts,” I’d be all for it. But we can’t. We’ll never be able to guarantee that. So the decision becomes this: Do we withhold support for the deserving in order to make sure that the undeserving don’t get it? Or do we give support to the undeserving to make sure that the deserving do get it?

As much as it pains me, I have to go with the latter. Like conservatives, I hate the idea of people screwing up and then taking advantage of others. But I hate more the idea of good people not being helped because of the selfishness of others.